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Crescent City Connection fund can pay for lighting, other services for three-plus years

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The Crescent City Connection transition fund can sustain lighting the 13-mile corridor and other services for a little more than three years, according to Walter Brooks, Regional Planning Commission executive director.
(David Grunfeld, NOLA.com|The Times-Picayune)

The Crescent City Connection transition fund has a $4.4 million balance, enough to cover expenses, including the bridge's decorative lights, for a little more than three years, according to the Regional Planning Commission's executive director.

Walter Brooks, RPC executive director, said he will meet with elected officials in the coming weeks to talk about long-term funding for utilities and other services.

"We're going to be facing basically a $1.3 million requirement on a recurring basis,'' Brooks said referring to enhanced maintenance and utilities.

On Tuesday (June 10), the commission renewed its annual cooperative endeavor agreement with the state Department of Transportation and Development for trash pick up, mowing and lighting. In turn, DOTD contracts with local governments, including Jefferson Parish and Gretna, for the work.

Discussion on the lighting issue at the RPC meeting was prompted by a recent WVUE Fox 8 News report that funding would run out at the end of June. State Sen. J.P. Morrell told the television station the commission should pay the lighting bill.

The bridge's decorative lights were disconnected in March 2013 for more than two weeks when the RPC, a panel of elected officials and civic leaders, approved using the transition fund for lighting, grass cutting and litter pick up. But the ornamental lights that outline the span were excluded.

West Bank residents were outraged, viewing the action as punitive for their opposition to a 20-year extension of bridge tolls. The Young Leadership Council, which raised money for the decorative lights in the 1980s, paid the utility bill for three months until the commission agreed to use the transition fund.

Lighting costs are about $500,000 a year for the 13-mile CCC corridor that runs from the Broad Street overpass along the West Bank Expressway to the Huey P. Long Bridge. The electricity bill for decorative lamps averages about $1,500 a month, according to engineer Scott Boyle of the transportation department. Maintenance for the decorative lights is another $90,000 a year, he said.

The transition fund started the 2014 fiscal year with about $5.7 million. Boyle estimates services will cost about $1.3 million this year.

RPC will study converting the decorative lights to LEDs, which could lower operating costs about 80 percent, Brooks said. The agency will consult with representatives in Seattle and Miami, where LED lights are being used, about their experiences.

"We're more comfortable with trying to find some capital money to change out the lighting than we are to try to keep coming up with this recurring cost of $500,000 a year in lighting expenses,'' Brooks said. "We've got to look at some creative ways to do this. It's not an easy challenge.''